


The Becoming

by Elster



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Gen, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-21
Updated: 2010-09-21
Packaged: 2017-10-12 02:04:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/119581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elster/pseuds/Elster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It begins with the initiation, the Untempered Schism.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Becoming

It begins with the initiation, the Untempered Schism. You're a child and you look into eternity and it's like you've been blind all your life, but now you see, just for a moment. You see past reality, into the vortex, which is the whole of time and space, something vast and daunting, something not even Gallifreyan has the words to describe; and you see your place in all that.  
Some are inspired. Some run away. Some go mad.  
That's when you know who you are.

He is nervous like never before in his life. His legs feel strange/weak/nebular, like the molecules have shifted further away from each other, a loss of density, subtle at first, but then undeniable, and they might not carry him. But he stumbles on, follows the priests.   
He is proud, too, and he tries to concentrate on that. It's meant to be. This is initiation, when you become one of them, a Time Lord, when you stop being a mere child.   
The Untempered Schism comes into sight as they reach the top of the hill. His stomach drops or maybe it's the nebular feeling growing. There is a feeling of _wrong_ like a smell that makes his head hurt and his breath hitch. It's dizzying/cunfusing/hurting, he wants to run away now.  
But that's not an option, he reminds himself. This is more than tradition, it's who they are, it's part of what makes them and it's not something he can avoid. It's not something he _wants_ to avoid, he just never thought it would be so frightening. He takes a deep breath (it's not a smell, it's not; it's not even _real_ ) and tries to focus on the priest's hand on his shoulder. It's okay, he can do this.  
He stands before it and doesn't look inside at first, looks at the carvings in the stone circle instead. A stone circle surrounding it, like surgical instruments holding open a wound. It's not even avoidance, though it is that, too; it's him, curious for the tiny random things, anxious he could miss one of them, hesitant to get to the core. He looks at the carvings, not into it, but he can feel/smell/understand that this is wrong and strange. Strange like death and things before time, things beyond. A tear in reality, a hole in the world. It is so clearly wrong, a broken spot in the universe. An impossible thing that might destroy him just as easily as enlighten him.   
The nebular feeling has reached his head and he can't really feel anything anymore. Everything became unreal, unreal like this Thing. He himself could become unreal, an ever shifting part of the swirling mist. Like everything that's right and known and belonging shies away from the Thing. _Cursed ground_ , he thinks. He has to look, it's the only option. A deep breath and the smell/feeling/understanding is gagging him, but he shifts his gaze and it's blindig.  
Like suddenly being blind, at first, but then like seeing for the first time and all there is is light and pain so you don't really see at all. It's not even a second, but he understands that there's no difference between those two. That you can gain and lose the same thing in a heartbeat and that the Thing can enlighten and destroy him, break him whole.  
Only a second and he closes his eyes and hears a sound, his own scream, and he runs like he should have done all along, runs until his legs feel heavy and he stumbles. He runs and hides, eyes closed and crying.  
It's fierce clarity, something about himself, and it's a crippling wound. He shivers with shame and confusion. It's unfair. He knows, he understands, he just couldn't look. He draws his knees up to his chest; the fabric is torn and his tears sting in the wounds, but he cries because of a different pain, a brand new pain, more persistant than anything he knew.  
He'll never be one of them.

He's excited. It's the first day of another person's life. A better person, a real person. He waited for this day, initiation, couldn't wait to become one of them. Being a child is like being unfinished, being useless and worthless, just growing until someday you're someone. This unavoidable, dull helpless phase, a short time for a Time Lord, but you're not and so for you that few years are eternity.  
Now, that will change, _he_ will change. Everything is new, even the feeling of his feet gripping the ground, the quality of the light, the feeling of air against his face. Starry coolshifting night air, like a huff, a small unimpressed laughter. It's alright for the night to be unimpressed, he's nothing, but he will _become_. He's impatient, wants to shake the hand of the priest from his shoulder and just run up the damn hill and finally see it. He wants to become a Time Lord. It's destiny, as clear as that, and he knows it will happen anyway, destiny, but why can't they just hurry up? They reach the top of the hill and the Untempered Schism comes into sight. His stomach does a flip and it takes all his selfcontrol not to run. It's right there, he can see it, he can _hear_ it, like a beat, like hearts, like life. It's still a few dozen steps away, but he stares right into it, afraid he might miss something. Would be a bad joke to come and see the Schism and miss the revelation. At first, it's just movement, a swirling of somthing strange, something undefined and unreal, and the sound.   
The sound is his hearts and a noise that defies description, neither whistle, nor growl, nor anything he ever heard and it's building up. At first he thinks it's because he's coming closer, but then he's standing right before it, watching the incomprehensible swirl and listening to the sound. It's changing, intensifying, _amplifying_ like a feedback loop, an echo making a sound making an echo making a sound... He watches and he sees.  
It's like he was blind and he's seeing for the first time. It takes his breath, it swallows his thoughts, makes him empty and fills him up with something nameless and ancient and he'd feel like crying and laughing, but he's not sure he can feel anything at all. He just _sees_. He sees everything, sees the working of it and he sees his place in it and it makes him... he becomes...  
It's strange when he opens his eyes again. He opens them to the old blindness of reality, the priest watching him. At first he can't believe how different the world is, how he can see swirls of the Thing in everything, like reality is just shapes in the mist. But then, after a moment of true beauty, a moment of peace, when everything made sense in a way that doesn't, it shifts back to normal. Back to blind.  
He feels the loss like a pain and it stirrs something inside him that wasn't there when he climbed the hill. It's a burning snake in his guts like an urge, like anger, like a war cry. Something driving, an energy pulsing with the rhythm of his hearts. It fills him out, it defines him and he welcomes it as the gift it is. The knowledge is falling away, he can feel himself forgetting most of the things he's seen, but the new thing stays. The thing that makes him. Just burries a bit deeper and coils and waits.  
He gets up and shakes dust off his clothes and smiles.

It begins with the initiation. You're a child and you look into eternity, like seeing for just one moment. You see what not even Gallifreyan has the words to describe, you see your place and you become a Time Lord.  
It's what makes them. The knowledge, the power and the madness.


End file.
